


Sometimes We Settle

by Holz9364



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-12
Updated: 2020-05-12
Packaged: 2021-03-02 19:53:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,675
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24152362
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Holz9364/pseuds/Holz9364
Summary: Although she was gone, the Doctor never forgot about Rose Tyler.
Relationships: Eleventh Doctor/Rose Tyler, Tenth Doctor/Rose Tyler, Twelfth Doctor/Rose Tyler
Comments: 8
Kudos: 101





	Sometimes We Settle

**Author's Note:**

> Taken from thoughts I had or posts I saw on pinterest about the Doctor and Rose.
> 
> Specifically, the fact that we don't know what he saw when he looked into his room in the episode, "God Complex" and the fact he threw the TARDIS manual into a supernova! 
> 
> This is my first dip into Doctor Who fanfiction (because I just rewatched the entire stories thanks to Covid-19!!) so please be nice!

Rule one. The Doctor lies.

River knew it, she knew how much it hurt when he lied but she also knew that he had to. She had to lie too, all of the time. She had to pretend that she had no foreknowledge, and it broke her heart.

But this was different. The Doctor didn’t just lie about the future or the present, he lied about his past. He lied to River, to Amy, to Rory. He put on a mask and pretended that he was happy, that the losses he had suffered hadn’t shaped him into the man he was now.

There were things that he had buried a long time ago, things that he wanted to stay buried because if he forgot about them, then they stopped hurting him. The trouble was that Amelia Pond was curious, and she didn’t just let things go. If she wanted an answer to a question, she would get it, at any cost.

It was for this reason that the Doctor spoke about something, about someone, that he had buried a long time ago.

“Who did you see?”

He didn’t answer at first.

“You looked into your room,” Amy continued stubbornly, “I know that you did.”

He sighed and kicked his legs, causing the swing to sway as he fiddled with cables underneath the TARDIS control panel.

“I know you,” Amy added, cocking her head at him, “We’re in a hotel where ‘our’ room contains our greatest fear or something equally as terrifying so what does the Doctor do? Look in his room of course.”

Well, she wasn’t wrong. The Doctor glanced up at her, “Yes, I looked in my room.”

“So what did you see?” Amy asked, irritation slipping into her voice, “I think it’s only fair that you tell me. You saw mine, the embarrassing truth that you are the only thing I have faith in.”

“It’s not embarrassing,” The Doctor said, letting his hands drop to his side, “We all have faith in something or…someone.”

Amy sat on the edge of the panel and looked at him, “Did you see someone you have faith in?”

He nodded, unable to meet her eye, “I saw the person I always had faith in. Don’t get me wrong, I have had faith in a lot of people. I’ve got faith in all of the people I bring travelling with me, but this one was different. She gave me hope,” he rubbed his eyes and blinked hard.

“Hope,” Amy said softly.

“You have only seen one face Amy, _this_ face,” The Doctor said, finally looking up at her, “But it’s not just the faces that change, it’s me. Things change me, people change me and when I met her…I was fresh from a war, I was full of anger and rage and hatred.”

Amy frowned, she couldn’t imagine her Doctor like that.

“She made me better,” The Doctor said quietly, “And she stood by me until the end.”

“Did she die?” Amy asked quietly.

The Doctor shook his head, “No, but she might as well have done. I can never see her again…not where she is.”

“And even now, she’s what you have faith in?”

“I believed in her,” The Doctor said, frowning as memories he had spent a long time trying to forget flooded him, “I didn’t believe in a lot at that time in my life but I believed in Rose Tyler.”

Amy heard his voice break a little when he uttered her name. She jumped down to stand in front of him, “Rose? That’s a pretty name.”

“She was a pretty thing,” The Doctor said, his fond smile becoming a grimace, “My yellow and pink human.”

“Were you two…?” Amy trailed off.

The Doctor could only nod.

“And you still love her,” Amy said softly. It wasn’t a question, it didn’t need to be. She was his best friend, she could see what speaking about Rose Tyler was doing to him.

The Doctor cleared his throat, “But she’s gone, and she has been gone for a very long time. I haven’t even seen her since I got this face.”

“Can’t you go back then?” Amy asked, “She wouldn’t recognise you if you went back to a time before you met her, just to say hi.”

“I could do it,” The Doctor said, turning his back to her, “I have done it, but…it hurts too much.”

Amy frowned, “And you can’t change your own personal history.”

“I’m not supposed to,” The Doctor said, “I could, but it might cause a massive paradox or just erase me out of existence. Besides, I’ve spent a lot of time trying to move on. I found you and Rory, and I met River. Seeing Rose again now would just be too complicated.”

“Do you love her? River that is, do you love her the way that you loved Rose?” Amy asked curiously, there was no malice or anger in her voice.

The Doctor just sighed and got to his feet. Amy thought that the conversation was over, but as he left he turned and said, “The love of your life isn’t always the one you marry.”

Those words struck a chord with Amy. For a while, she might have felt that way about the Doctor and Rory. Because of that, she nodded, understanding his plight perfectly.

* * *

The Doctor tried his best to forget about the conversation and force the memories back into the vault in his head where he liked them to stay. Sometimes he would wake at night with visions of a pink blur, with a flash of blonde hair, that smile engrained in his vision and that laugh echoing in his ears, but he brushed it off.

Soon after that, he lost Amy and Rory, and he spent some time on his own until Clara came into his life. He loved travelling with Clara, but she caused painful memories to come to the fore too because she reminded him so much of Rose that it hurt.

Sometimes she would say something bright and save the day or bring him down with a sarcastic remark and his heart would ache to see Rose again. He knew that it was unfair to Clara, to keep her around as some bargain basement replacement, but he did truly enjoy her company. He flirted with her but rebuffed her advances because of the similarities that she bore to the girl he had loved with all of his hearts.

He had never told Clara about Rose.

When he did tell her, it was an accident. He had been poisoned and while he tried not to die, he was yelling instructions at Clara so that she could save his life. She was panicking on the inside but doing a spectacular job of keeping up a calm façade.

She saved him, he did not doubt that she would, she was his impossible girl.

But afterwards, as she sat next to his bed and watched him curiously, she spoke softly, “She must have been someone very special.”

“Who?” The Doctor asked, opening his eyes.

Clara smiled at him, she was sad but she smiled, “Rose.”

The Doctor frowned.

“You said her name, over and over, while you were feverish,” Clara explained, “You said, Rose Tyler, I love you.”

The Doctor closed his eyes and sighed.

“Who was she?” Clara asked curiously.

“She was someone I loved,” The Doctor confessed, “But she’s gone now.”

“What happened to her?”

“We were separated,” The Doctor said, images of Rose flying towards the void flashing into his head, “She was sent to a parallel world where I could never see her again. She lived out the rest of her days with a clone of me there.”

“You must have loved her a lot,” Clara said, reaching for his hand.

“I did,” The Doctor said simply.

At this, Clara dropped the subject, which he was grateful for.

* * *

The Doctor didn’t think about Rose for a very long time after that. He changed his face, but Clara stayed by his side. Just like Rose had done. The next time she came up in conversation was when the TARDIS malfunctioned and began to soar down towards Earth at a worrying speed.

“Doctor! Why isn’t there a manual?”

The Doctor rolled his eyes, “Because I threw it into a supernova!”

Clara looked up from the control panel while they were crashing, “You threw it into a supernova?”

“Yes Clara, keep up,” He said in his abrasive Scottish way.

“Why?” Clara asked in disbelief.

“Because I didn’t agree with it,” The Doctor answered irritably.

“What could you possibly not agree with in the rule book?” Clara muttered.

The Doctor pulled a lever and ran around the centre console. She had no idea what he did, but the TARDIS began to stabilize.

“It told me that there was no way to travel to parallel universes,” The Doctor answered.

Clara remembered the conversation they had about Rose after he had been delusional, back when he was in his previous form.

“So you knew you would never be able to go back to Rose,” Clara said with a nod.

The Doctor said nothing.

“She must have been the love of your life, to make you throw the TARDIS manual into a supernova, I mean the TARDIS is practically your wife,” Clara joked.

The Doctor didn’t find it funny. He just sighed and braced himself on the centre console, “Yes well…sometimes the love of your life isn’t the one that you marry,” he said simply.

Clara didn’t bother him on the subject any further. She knew when to push and when to just let the Doctor brood.

The Doctor allowed those images to flash before him briefly then blocked them out as his hearts clenched at the thought of her. It had been so many years but Rose Tyler had left a mark on both of his hearts and although his love for her had faded through the years, it would never disappear.

**The End!** **☹**

**Author's Note:**

> It's really bugging me, I know the quote about "sometimes the love of our life isn't the one we marry" is from a movie but I can't remember which one or find out via google so if anyone knows, please let me know! :)


End file.
